When you buy a whole chicken or turkey, you usually get the giblets stuffed inside the cavity. You can toss them out, feed them to the dog or, if you like flavor, make gravy out of them.
It’s surprisingly easy although, to be honest, you shouldn’t go into it expecting the same kind of texture you get from instant or pre-made gravy.
Giblets aren’t really pretty when you start. Set the neck bone aside and dice the soft pieces.
Fry everything over extremely high heat with a little olive pomace oil or, even better, bacon fat.
Don’t use non-stick. You want the brown bits stuck to the pan. Once everything’s cooked through, remove the neck bone, add enough water to deglaze the pan, and scrape up all the brown bits.
Turn the heat down to low and add a light dusting of flour, just enough for a thin coating over all the giblets. Cook over low heat for five minutes or so, just until the flour doesn’t taste raw any more.
Scoop everything into a food processor and process until smooth. Return to the pan and warm everything through again. Add salt and pepper and check the flavor. Add more salt. And pepper. Gravy needs more than you thought.
Strain through cheesecloth into your gravy boat.
And that’s it.
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Want more like this? For more recipes like this, that you can hold right in your hands, and write on, take notes, tear pages out if you want (Gosh, you're tough on books, aren't you?) you might be interested in How To Cook Like Your Grandmother, 2nd edition, Illustrated. Or to learn your way around the kitchen, check out Starting From Scratch: The Owner's Manual for Your Kitchen.
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One Comment
I may have to try your giblet gravy recipe. My Grandmother and I have always boiled the neck and giblets, peeled the meat from the bones, and ran it all thru a fine mesh meat grinder. Neither of us has ever had a blender. I only use bacon grease when frying, and pure lard when baking. Lard is getting hard to find these days, but there is one butcher shop in town that still sells it. Cooking like my Grandmother is the only way I know. She has been gone a long time now, but she taught me to cook on an old wood stove. She passed away in 1960, and my own mother is now 98 yrs old. I guess I am no spring chicken anymore, LOL